Monument to Violence
– a solo exhibition by Peter Brandt
Why there are no memorials to victims of sexual or physical violence as there are memorials to the dead? This is the question asked by the Danish artist Peter Brandt, who proposes to lay the first stone to monument to violence via his solo exhibition at Memory of The Future, from October 12nd - November 9th.
Violence is a physical, psychological, verbal or passive act of force that causes or is intended to cause harm. Peter Brandt’s work, drawn from personal experiences of violence, seeks also to address to all. By first exploring the origins of violence, reminding that violence manifests itself also in private as in the public sphere, and it can be inflicted within the family, as by strangers or by society. Violence is just as much physical as psychological; it may affect any age of life, any genre, gender, as maybe found in any socio-economic or cultural spheres. Then, by exploring its consequences on the victims, who all, without exception, share irreversible post-traumatic symptoms that are deeply ingrained in their personality and express themselves through feelings of shame, alienation, loss of self-confidence, loss of ‘other…
In some works, such as UNSPEAKABLE, 100 Years of Violation or in Black Sun, the artist seeks to translate into artistic language some healing techniques from Eastern or Western cultures. If the techniques differ or can complement each other, the experience of violence and its consequences are quite universal.
Peter Brandt’s work focuses repeatedly on the questioning of the “masculine” order as a factor of violence, which, by preventing the expression of the singularities of each, generates rejection and discrimination. For this exhibition Monument of Violence, Peter Brandt has produced soft-spoken works that contrast with the powerful messages they convey. Like the video I did not invite you into my body which presents a succession of monotype texts, as if they had been written by a child victim, assembled to a sound recording of breaths; the whole constituting a mental landscape that emphasizes feelings of alienation and dissociation. If in fact the violence is known, through images, stories, through personal experiences or lived by kinsfolks, Peter Brandt places us at the right distance to call for our attention, in the same way as the commemorative monuments in the public square do, as our duty to remember, our duty to act! To act collectively and individually and to profoundly change the mechanisms that produce this violence, while generate the conditions necessary to recognize and protect the victims.
Curators: Margalit Berriet - Marie-Cécile Berdaguer.
Peter Brandt (DK 1966) studied at The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen and at The Royal Institute of Arts in Stockholm. Brandt’s work is influenced by 1970s feminist body art, trauma theory, masculinity studies and art historical material. The body is Brandt’s most vital material either in direct performative photographs and video works or in the making of hand-crafted works in a wide range of materials. Brandt’s latest solo show was “The Image as The Witness” at Memory of The Future in Paris in 2018 and in 2016 did Västerås Art Museum in Sweden organize “Post Trauma Documents” a comprehensive mid-career survey exhibition with selected works from 2000-2016.
Recent group exhibitions include “Yes and More No” Espace Thorigny, Paris, 2018, “Between The Lines” The Womens Museum, Kongsvinger, Norway, 2018, “Shaking The Habitual: What is your Utopia? Meter Artspace, Copenhagen 2018, “Man, Woman and The Sea” the Museum of New Art, Pärnu, Estonia 2017, “EXITUS: Death, Grief and Melancholy” Gallery F15, Moss Norway, 2017/Galerie im Körnerpark, Berlin 2015.
Brandt has been awarded residences at Delfina Foundation, London, Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, Circolo Scandinavo, Rome, The Danish Institute, Rome and is the recipient of several grants from The Danish Arts Foundation, Queen Ingrid Roman Foundation and others.
Opening: Friday October 11, at 7 pm. Performance at 8.30 pm: Les Corps Fragilesa choreography by Charlotte Colmant., dancers: Gildas Lemonnnier & Simo Erin.
Exhibition period: October 12 – November 9, 2019.
The exhibition is supported by the Danish Arts Foundation and Grosserer L.F. Foghts Grant.